Celebrities remake themselves in AI

The Future. Celebrities increasingly worry about the size and scope of their digital footprint… and AI avatars and chatbots developed by some of the biggest companies in Silicon Valley give them the ability to be everywhere, all at the same time. While the opportunities present both great risk and reward, it may be up to the entertainment industry to ensure that technologies are developed to protect those who don’t want to be a part of it.

Endless exposure
The first betas of celebrity-driven chatbots have arrived.

• Meta launched AI characters that are thinly veiled caricatures of their celebrity voices, including Kendall Jenner, Tom Brady, and MrBeast.
• YouTube debuted the song-snippet generator “Dream Track,” which features the signed-off voices of T-Pain, Charlie Puth, and Charli XCX.
• Soul Machines rolled out full-on celebrity avatars of people like Francis Ngannou, K-pop star Mark Tuan, and golfer Jack Nicklaus.

Silicon Valley believes that the next phase of the influencer economy will be AI-generated… but they’re still in that early-days, skeptical adoption phase. They hope that tapping celebrities will help ease the inevitable transition. And it looks like a number of celebrities clearly feel the same and are getting in on the ground floor to ensure massive paydays (Meta is paying millions).

But that doesn’t come without risk. Users were able to make Jenner’s Meta chatbot (named “Billie) recommend tequila brands that weren’t her own 818 Tequila label, and the avatar of influencer Caryn Marjorie was goaded into engaging in sexually explicit conversations… that’s not to mention the raft of scams and misinformation that are already happening with deepfakes of celebrities.